
Class S F-5" 
Book__M 



V. 



Copyright N?_ 



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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 







The Skillful 
New England Raiser 
tells us some of the Secretin 
of the Successful Raisiif" 
of Turkeys 




MISS MAHANET AT TURKEY PARK 



Margaret Mahaney 

TALKS ABOUT TURKEYS 



By 

MARGARET MAHANEY 



THE SKILLFUL NEW ENGLAND 
RAISER TELLS US SOME OF THE 
SECRETS OF THE SUCCESSFUL 
RAISING OF TURKEYS 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE PARK & POLLARD CO, 
BOSTON, MASS. 



Copyright 191 3 by 
THE PARK & POLLARD CO. 

Boston, Mass. 



Copyright 191 5 by 
MARGARET MAHANEY 

Concord, Massachusetts 



©CIA428217 

MAR 13 1916 
It* .1 



MARGARET MAHANEY 

Talks About Turkeys 

Price, $1.00 



INTRODUCTION 
By Philip R. Park 

MORE than a century and a quar- 
ter ago there was fired in Con- 
cord, Mass., a shot that was heard 
around the world. This shot termi- 
nated the domination of monopoly and 
marked the opening of a new era, — the 
building of a new empire. 

Not less important to all lovers of 
turkeys is the shot fired in this same 
beautiful old town by Margaret Ma- 
haney, when she first put an end to the 
bogy that has been hovering over the 
Turkey industry so long, i. e., Black- 
head. Not less triumphant has been 
her conquest of practically all the ail- 
ments besetting this beautiful bird. 

iii 



It is really beyond belief that Miss 
Mahaney has raised in a season 300 
turkeys with a loss of less than 2 per 
cent, when for years the Experiment 
Stations and Agricultural Colleges, as 
well as nearly all poultrymen, have 
claimed that turkeys could not be raised 
in this State. All would recognize this 
as wonderful work if applied to chick- 
ens, but when accomplished with tur- 
keys it is doubly wonderful. These 
same Experiment Station directors had 
told Miss Mahaney that she could not 
do the things she was already accom- 
plishing, but when they visited her 
farm they held up their hands and de- 
parted, acknowledging that here was a 
woman who had performed the miracle. 

Miss Mahaney was a wonderfully 
capable trained nurse who broke down 
at her work and was ordered to the 
country to save her life, urged particu- 



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larly to take up some out-of-door work. 
Poultry keeping appealed to her from 
the first, but turkeys particularly for 
the reason of the difficulties to be sur- 
mounted. If she could do what others 
could not she would be satisfied. Any- 
one could raise chickens, but hardly 
anyone could raise turkeys. Here was 
a task that delighted her and a prob- 
lem that appealed to her. The diffi- 
culties she encountered would have dis- 
couraged any one but a pioneer of her 
character. Her deep maternal instinct 
(and she is, figuratively speaking, 
mother to everything and everybody 
upon the beautiful estate where she 
lives) brought the babies and old tur- 
keys through their blackhead troubles, 
and from her medical training, to- 
gether with the aid she received from 
contact with members of her family 
who were physicians, she recognized 



symptoms and remedies which one 
could acknowledge as miracles and not 
overstep the truth. She has applied 
the fruits of her life work to the solv- 
ing of a problem, and some day the 
country at large from Maine to Cali- 
fornia will raise its hat to Marga- 
ret Mahaney, the lady from Concord, 
Mass., who restored what was supposed 
to be lost : — the art of raising turkeys, 
— and that in confinement in poultry 
houses under practically the same con- 
ditions as chickens. 

If you find time to go to Concord, by 
all means call on Miss Mahaney and 
she will make you welcome. She will 
show you more turkeys than have ever 
before been raised in one flock in the 
eastern states, and she will delight in 
telling you the simple methods she 



VI 



uses. On the following pages she will 
tell you in her own way how she accom- 
plishes it. 

We repeat, Miss Mahaney is a won- 
derful woman. She has a beautiful 
estate on which to produce these birds, 
but others are doing just as wonderful 
work with them by following her teach- 
ings. 



Vll 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction iii 

a Letter to My Readers 3 

Facts About Turkey Raising. . 13 

Breeding 15 

Brief Outline of My Method 

of Raising Turkeys 23 

Throwing the Red 27 

Breeding 31 

Selection and Treatment of 

Breeding Stock 31 

Rules for the Selection of 

Stock 32 

Kind of Hens to Select 33 

Number of Females to One 

Male 35 

Care to be Given Breeding 

Stock 36 



IX 



Mating 38 

Feeding During Breeding 

Season 38 

Nests and Nesting 40 

Hatching 42 

First Feed 43 

Avoid Vermin 45 

The Setting of the Turkey 

Hen 46 

The Throwing of the Red and 

Young Turkeys 55 

Investigation of Diseases 65 

Blackhead 71 

My First Successful Fight 

Against Blackhead 73 

To Detect Blackhead 78 

Treatment of Full Grown 

Turkeys 79 

Blackhead in Young Turkeys 81 

Starts with a Common Cold 84 
Treatment of a Common 

Cold 84 

Common Diseases 91 

Rheumatism 91 



X 



"Rotten Crop," Sometimes 

Mistaken for Blackhead . . 93 
Cold — Catarrh — Cough — 

Bronchitis 94 

Roup 96 

Consumption of the Throat. . 100 

Consumption of the Lungs . . 101 

Swollen Heads 104 

Sore Eyes and Head 109 

Constipation in Turkeys 110 

Diarrhea 112 

Diarrhea in Little Turkeys. . 115 

Gapes 116 

Tape Worm 117 

Peritonitis 119 

The Bronze Turkey 125 

The Organs and Size 125 

Coloring 126 

Selection of Breeding Stock. . 127 

Marketing 129 

Dressing 130 

Shipping 131 



XI 



FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS 

Miss Mahaney at Turkey Park 

Frontispiece 

Miss Mahaney's $150.00 Prize 
Tom v 

Showing Style of Runs 17 

The Mahaney System Develops 
Strong, Hardy Birds 23 

"Give the Turkeys All the Milk 
You Can" 26 

R. I. Reds and Plymouth Rocks 
Make Excellent Mothers 43 

Breeding Pens 47 

Turkeys Should Be Tamed 51 

Friends (Miss Mahaney and 
"Grandma Cleaves") 77 

Women Make the Most Success- 
ful Turkey Raisers 82 

Turkeys Thrive Best on High 
Land 92 

Turkey Raising Is an Interest- 
ing and Healthful Occupation 126 



Xlll 



A LETTER TO MY READERS 



A LETTER TO MY READERS 

Turkey Park, 

Concord, Mass. 
My dear Readers: — 

The following is a copy of a letter 
recently received by me, and which rep- 
resents the type of communications I 
have received daily for over three years 
from all parts of the country: 

My dear Miss Mahaney: — 

Altho we are strangers to 
each other, I am writing you 
today, regarding turkey rais- 
ing. I read some time ago in 
the "Boston Post" that you had 
good success in raising turkeys, 
so I take the liberty of writing 
you for instructions, if you will 
kindly give them to me. I have 



tried for several years to raise 
a few, but it has been a hard 
job. They would do well for 
about six or seven weeks, then 
grow sick with liver and bowel 
trouble and fade away. Now 
what is the trouble? What 
must they be fed with? Must 
they range or be kept in a yard? 
In fact, what way must I man- 
age to raise turkeys? What is 
your experience? Please write 
me. 

Sincerely, 

etc. 

It is in answer to such letters as the 
foregoing that I am placing my meth- 
ods in book form on the market, in 
order to enlighten the breeders of tur- 
keys and to inform them how I first 
succeeded where others have failed. 

In the first place, I visited two or 
three farms in the country. I found 
that no care whatever was taken of the 

Page four 



turkeys. A common hen was fairly 
well looked after, fed and kept warm. 
The turkey was supposed to forage for 
itself, roost on old wagons or any sort 
of roost that the bird found convenient 
at night and in all kinds of weather. 
Conditions were anything but sanitary. 
Inbreeding was permitted year after 
year, as one torn was thought sufficient 
for the hen turkeys of five or six neigh- 
bors. 

I visited one farm in particular, 
which had on it turkeys from very 
nice stock, about twenty in all. Of 
course they were small and pale, and 
had not developed as they should have. 
They roosted in a sort of shed right off 
the barn cellar, so that they had access 
to the barn cellar, and they roamed 
around on the manure pile all day. 
The manure was turned down through 
an opening under the cows. The roof 

Page -five 



of that shed had no shingles on it, and 
in wet weather the rain simply poured 
down on those birds. It is only natural 
that conditions such as these will bring 
on roup and all kinds of diseases. The 
birds will not be developed and cannot 
possibly be strong enough when the 
spring comes to fulfill the duties of the 
breeding season. 

Birds hatched amid such surround- 
ings are tainted with roup and other 
afflictions. 

It is not very long ago since I had 
a talk with a gentleman from Vermont. 
He told me that at one time Vermont 
made a large amount of money in tur- 
key raising. When the turkeys got to 
be four or five weeks old, the raisers 
simply turned them out, and let them 
take care of themselves. Those that 
lived through the summer, weathered 
storms and all other sorts of hardships, 

Page six 



they rounded up in the fall, fattened 
for market or sold for breeders. This 
was what they called "clear profit." 
Everyone can readily understand to 
what that "clear profit" has led. 

The result is that our splendid bronze 
turkeys are dying out by the thousands 
each year, and within seven or eight 
more years, if something is not done to 
strengthen the turkey and keep it up 
to the standard of at least the common 
hen, our famous turkey of America will 
be a thing of the past. Whereas, if the 
turkey when hatched is given good feed 
as described in another part of my book, 
taken care of until the red is thrown, 
and then turned into a good, warm shed 
at night, kept dry and warm in damp 
weather, and fed reasonably, three- 
thirds of the trouble in raising turkeys 
can be avoided. 

Page seven 



Care must be given to the breeding 
hens. They must be kept in sanitary 
quarters, given plenty of good feed, 
with four drops of tincture of iron to 
a gallon of water, plenty of lime and 
sand, about half and half, and left 
where they can eat it at their own 
convenience. If you give ground bone, 
have it very fine, for it is apt to lodge 
in the corner of the mouth and some- 
times will cause ulceration. When this 
happens, the jowl of the bird will be- 
come swollen, and on close examina- 
tion, there will be found a small piece 
of white bone which will have to be 
removed and the mouth washed with 
Sulpho-Napthol or Presto Disinfectant. 
I generally use my salve two or three 
times before the wound is healed. If 
the bird that lays the eggs is good and 
strong, the turkeys that are hatched 

Page eight 



will be strong and rugged, and to "keep 
them growing from the start" has al- 
ways been my motto. 

In my closing paragraph I wish to 
say to all my readers that I have been 
most sincere and straightforward in 
everything that I have written in this 
book. To one and all who may read 
this, I extend a cordial invitation to 
visit my turkey farm in Concord, Mas- 
sachusetts, that you may see for your- 
selves the progress I have made in the 
last eight years in raising turkeys in 
yards under the same conditions as 
chickens, a feat which has been claimed 
heretofore by experiment stations to 
be impossible to accomplish, in poultry- 
congested New England. 

I have labored with the problem of 
turkey raising for many years, and 
sincerely believe myself to be in a posi- 
tion to advise others who may be be- 

Page nine 



ginners, as I once was, concerning the 
difficulties of turkey raising, and the 
best method of overcoming them. 
I remain, 

Sincerely yours, 

Margaret Mahaney. 
March 19, 1913. 



Page ten 



FACTS ABOUT TURKEY RAISING 



FACTS ABOUT TURKEY RAISING 

THE one great essential on the 
part of a person raising or at- 
tempting to raise turkeys is patience, 
or persistency, whichever you care to 
call it. To anyone thinking of start- 
ing in this work I can only say that 
you will meet with plenty of difficulties 
and much that will discourage and dis- 
hearten you, but when you remember 
that each failure or discouragement 
means just that much more added to 
your knowledge of, and experience in 
this work, it should give you heart to 
keep on, and if you do keep on and on, 
using each little bit of experience thus 
gained and using it to good effect, in 
the end success is bound to come. I 

Page thirteen 



am going to tell you a few of the dis- 
couraging things that happened to me, 
and also of my method of raising tur- 
keys, a method based on long experi- 
ence and perfected in the face of many 
discouragements, and I hope that in the 
telling, you may learn something that 
will be of benefit. 

I started with twelve turkey eggs. 
Had I known then how hard they are 
to raise, I wonder if I would have at- 
tempted it? I hatched out eight tur- 
keys from that lot of eggs, and I raised 
just one. I named her Hen-Hen, and 
she is on my place today, and is at the 
head of all my flock. 

The following year I hatched out 
over thirty turkeys, and only succeeded 
in raising four. My work was then 
carried on on low land. The next year, 
I put old Hen-Hen on higher ground, 
where I am raising all my flock today. 

Page fourteen 



She hatched out fifteen turkeys, and I 
raised all but one. I killed off some of 
the young toms, and kept all the pul- 
lets, all of which I still have, and they 
are splendid, strong stock, short-legged, 
heavy and a splendid bronze. 

I then sent to Kentucky and brought 
out some of the best stock I could find 
down there, and then began my battle 
to raise turkeys. I had very good suc- 
cess, that is, as far as I went. At 
first, I knew hardly anything about the 
proper way to feed, and the right food 
to give my turkeys, but as the years 
went by, my experience in feeding 
taught me a great deal. 

BREEDING 

Now I will tell you in as concise a 
way as possible, the method I consider 
proper in raising turkeys. In the first 
place, it is necessary to have a good, 

Page -fifteen 



strong two-year-old hen to breed from 
with a torn that is no relation whatever 
to the family. One of the foremost 
things you must be particular not to do 
is to inbreed. I much prefer a com- 
mon hen to put my first hatch of eggs 
under; that will give the turkey hens 
a much longer time to lay. I consider 
it better to put my turkey hens on my 
June eggs. I put fifteen eggs under a 
turkey hen, and twelve under a common 
hen. 

When the little turkeys come out, I 
disinfect their heads and under the 
wings with my own salve. Have you 
ever seen a little turkey that has a 
cold in its head wipe its beak under 
its wing? I have many times found 
the feathers under their wings mat- 
ted as a result of this ill-bred habit 
of theirs. That, of course, is not a 
healthy state for a young bird that is 

Page sixteen 



growing, and that is the reason that I 
disinfect with my salve under their 
wings and on their heads, and they 
always seem brighter afterward. 

I have good, strong runs, 5 feet long 
and 4 feet wide, with high coops and 
thorough ventilation from the top, 
which carries off all the impure and 
overheated air, and keeps the temper- 
ature normal at the bottom of the coops 
for the little turkeys. On hot days I 
cover my runs with burlap. 

The turkeys must be kept clean and 
dry and their straw must be well aired 
every day. Once a week, I wash out 
the bottom of the coop with disinfect- 
ant, and put in clean straw. 

I give them all the lettuce they can 
eat three times daily, as the secret of 
raising turkeys is to keep their bowels 
in good order, and the droppings a 
bright green. Just as soon as I see a 

Page seventeen 



little turkey with its wings drooping, 
I take it away from the others and 
treat it as described on page 82. 

I have invented my own pills for the 
cure of blackhead and they are now 
being largely used by turkey raisers 
all through New England.* 

When my little turkeys are about 
three or four days old, I give them 
Margaret Mahaney Turkey Feed, and 
a little skimmed milk with a good solid 
feed of lettuce — all they can eat. At 
noon, I feed them lettuce again and 
clean water containing tincture of iron, 
4 drops to each gallon of water. At 
night, I feed them bread soaked in milk 
and lettuce cut up fine with an onion 
and a shake of red pepper. After 

*The call has been so heavy that it has been im- 
possible for me to handle the business of the remedies 
from my Concord home, and they are now for sale 
with The Park & Pollard Company of Boston. 

Page eighteen 



having dry feed all day, they relish the 
soft feed at night. There is no reason 
why, if you use my method in raising 
turkeys, and have your runs on high 
ground, you cannot be successful. 

If the turkeys are raised in the right 
way, they are no harder to raise than 
chickens. When the pullets are about 
four months old, they should be given 
Epsom salts twice a week (a small tea- 
spoonful to a gallon of water). This 
keeps the turkey in good condition and 
the blood cool. Also a tablespoonful 
of sulphate of iron in a pail of water 
should be left in some place where they 
can drink it. Keep them good and dry 
until they are ready for shipment, for 
turkeys are subject to blackhead until 
they are one year old. 

I will be only too glad to give any 
information in my power to people who 
are interested in this subject. While 

Page nineteen 



the Experimental Colleges have put out 
some bulletins on the care of turkeys, 
the person that is going to issue a re- 
port on the raising of turkeys must get 
out in the field and be with them from 
the time they are baby chicks until they 
are ready to be disposed of, and then it 
will be many years before he will know 
all there is to know about turkey rais- 
ing. I have spent years on my tur- 
keys, and I think that I am now in a 
position to give any information that 
any grower may require in regard to 
this matter. 



Page twenty 



BRIEF OUTLINE OF MY METHOD 
OF RAISING TURKEYS 



BRIEF OUTLINE OF MY METHOD 
OF RAISING TURKEYS 

IN the first place I select a good quiet 
hen that has been setting two or 
three days and put her in a deep, warm 
nest, not too far from the top of the 
box, so that when she goes to feed, the 
hen will not break the eggs by jumping 
on them when she returns to the nest. 
Twelve eggs seems a great number of 
turkey eggs to put under one hen, but 
that is what I put under every common 
hen, and I sometimes hatch out all the 
eggs. I spray the nests well with sul- 
phur and also use my salve on the hen 
up until the sixteenth day. I never put 
any disinfectant on the hen or on her 
nest after that because there is life in- 

Page twenty-three 



side the eggs by that time, and the dis- 
infectant is very apt to kill it. 

When the eggs begin to hatch, some 
will hatch out before the rest; these I 
take away, placing them in a good 
warm box wrapped in flannel and keep 
them good and warm until all the eggs 
are hatched out and the mother able to 
receive them. When they are two days 
old, I put the young turkeys in a good 
clean coop, well whitewashed and wa- 
terproof. My runs are 5 ft. long and 
4 ft. wide. I shut my little birds up 
in the coop for the first four days, until 
they become good and strong. After 
that, if the weather is fine and warm, 
I let them out about ten o'clock and put 
them in about three o'clock. 

Their first food consists of a hard 
boiled egg, a shake of red pepper and 
three parts dandelion, cut up fine. You 
can give them all the green food they 

Page twenty-four 



will eat, and also powdered charcoal 
and fine grit. After they are 3 or 4 
days old, I give them bread and milk 
squeezed dry, and the Margaret Ma- 
haney Turkey Feed. 

The young poults are kept in runs 
which should be moved to a new spot 
each day and care taken that they are 
kept clean, dry and warm, and the 
straw must be taken out of the coops 
and thoroughly aired and kept good 
and clean, as the safiitary condition 
is half the battle in raising turkeys. 
Place your runs on a side hill, facing 
the south. On hot days, cover the runs 
with burlap. 

Let them out into the runs for two 
hours or more every afternoon that is 
pleasant and dry until the time the 
birds are nine weeks old. Do not let 
them out in damp weather before they 
are two years old, for they are very 

Page twenty-five 



susceptible to dampness and should be 
kept housed and warm in rainy and 
damp weather. While the little birds 
are out, watch carefully for hawks and 
pests. 

Give the turkeys all the milk you can 
afford to give, as this will keep them 
growing. Plant a good field of lettuce 
and give them all this vegetable they 
can eat, and you will find that they will 
eat lettuce three times a day with good 
relish. 

One of the secrets of raising turkeys 
is to keep the droppings a bright green ; 
that, of course, keeps the liver in good 
condition, and goes a long way in keep- 
ing blackhead out of the flock. Take 
some lime, slack it, put half sand with 
it and make a sort of soft mush out of 
it. Place this on a board and dry it; 
then crumble it up and leave it around 
where your little turkeys can get it to 
eat. 

Page twenty-six 



Keep them in dry, tight houses with 
the south side open so that they may 
have an abundance of fresh air with- 
out draughts. 

When it is time to let them out of 
the runs, you can let them out for three 
and four hours at a time; you will find 
that they will want to go back to the 
runs when they become tired. Do not 
give them much feed at night; give 
them plenty of time to digest every- 
thing in their bowels, and they will then 
be ready for a good morning meal. 

THROWING THE RED 

When they show signs of throwing 
the red, put four drops of tincture of 
iron to a gallon of drinking water three 
or four times a week. If it is cold, 
rainy weather, put a drop of aconite 
in the water every day while the wet 
weather lasts. This will prevent their 

Page twenty-seven 



taking cold, and, as cold is the first sign 
of blackhead and diarrhea, it can be 
easily seen that a little precaution is 
worth more than a pound of cure. 

In regard to keeping lice off the little 
turkeys — you must disinfect your hens 
and the turkeys very frequently. My 
salve for that purpose is a convenient 
and effective remedy. 

If you will do as I have instructed 
you in the above paragraphs I do not 
think you will have much trouble in 
raising turkeys. Keep them dry by all 
means until they are five months old. 



Page twenty-eight 



BREEDING 



BREEDING 

SELECTION AND TREATMENT OF BREED- 
ING STOCK 

THERE are some rules that must 
be followed in the selection of tur- 
keys for breeding if it is hoped to suc- 
ceed. Careless indifference has given 
no end of trouble to turkey raisers. In 
some instances which the writer has 
investigated all the turkeys owned in 
one locality have descended from the 
one original bird purchased many years 
before! In one case it was said that 
for twenty years no new blood had come 
into the neighborhood. If this foolish 
procedure had been continued it would 
have resulted in the destruction of the 
constitutional vigor of the turkeys. 

Page thirty-one 



RULES FOR THE SELECTION OF STOCK 

A few plain rules which may be ob- 
served to advantage are as follows: 

1. Always use as breeders turkey 
hens over one year old. Be sure that 
they are strong, healthy and vigorous, 
of good medium size. In no instance 
select the smaller ones but do not strive 
to have them unusually large. 

2. The male may be a yearling 
or older. Do not imagine that the 
large, overgrown males are the best. 
Strength, health and vigor with a well 
proportioned medium size are the main 
points of excellence. 

3. Avoid close breeding. New blood 
is of vital importance to turkeys. Bet- 
ter send a thousand miles for a new 
male than risk the chance of inbreeding. 
Secure one in the fall so as to be assured 
of his healthy and vigorous constitution 
prior to the breeding season. 

Page thirty-two 



KIND OF HENS TO SELECT 

No matter what variety of turkey 
may be selected for keeping, they 
should, above all things, be strong, vig- 
orous, healthy and well matured, but 
not akin. Better secure the females 
from one locality and the male from an- 
other to insure their non-relationship 
rather than run the risk of inbreeding. 
In all fowls it is well to remember that 
size is influenced largely by the female 
and color and finish by the male. Se- 
curing an over-large male to mate with 
small, weakly hens is not wise policy. 
A medium size male with a good size fe- 
male of good constitutional vigor and 
mature age will do far better than the 
largest male bird with the smallest 
females. 

The wise farmer always selects the 
very best corn or grain of all kinds for 
seeds. Equal care should be given the 

Page thirty-three 



selection of the breeding stock in tur- 
keys. The best raised on the farm 
should be reserved for producers and 
the fact should be kept in mind that tur- 
key hens of the best quality after their 
second and third year make the best 
producers. Keep your best young hens 
with this in view. Undersized hens 
that lack constitutional vigor are not 
the kinds to select for successful turkey 
breeding. When you stop to consider 
that the male turkey is half of the en- 
tire flock in the matter of breeding, we 
may be led to greater care in the selec- 
tion. None can be too good for the pur- 
pose. Constitutional vigor is of the 
first importance. Without this he can 
have no value whatever for the purpose 
intended. Plenty of bone, a full round 
breast and a long body are important. 
No matter of what stock or breeding the 
hen may be, the male should be selected 

Page thirty-four 



from one of the standard varieties. If 
the hens are of the same standard va- 
riety the male of the same variety 
should be selected so as to maintain the 
stock in its purity. Well selected in- 
dividuals of some one of the several 
standard varieties will give better re- 
sults than can be secured by cross 
breeding, which has a tendency to bring 
to the surface the weak points of both 
sides of the cross. Proper crosses may 
improve the first issue but if followed 
up they rarely prove successful. 

NUMBER OF FEMALES TO ONE MALE 

The best rule for mating is to confine 
in yards, using eight or nine females 
to one male; some say twelve, but all I 
ever mate to one torn is eight females. 
The result of this number is that all 
my eggs prove fertile. 

When they are yarded and from 

Page thirty-five 



eight to ten females are kept, it is bet- 
ter to have two toms and keep one shut 
up while the other is with the hens, 
changing them at least twice a week. 
When they run at large on a farm they 
will naturally divide into flocks. Un- 
der such conditions use one male to no 
more than six females. 

CARE TO BE GIVEN BREEDING STOCK 

March and April are the two months 
of the year that the breeding hen should 
have particular care. In the first 
place, I keep them warm and comfort- 
able, with a box of sand where they can 
dust themselves every day. There is 
no bird that takes such pleasure in 
dusting herself as the turkey. She 
will roll on the sand for hours at a time 
in the sun, and this makes her happy 
and contented. 

Page Thirty-sir 



At this time I feed plenty of Marga- 
ret Mahaney Turkey Feed with Oyster 
Shells always within reach and a mix- 
ture of wheat, oats, barley, a very little 
cracked corn and beef scraps fed three 
or four times a week. Give plenty of 
drinking water and three or four times 
a week put a drop or two of tincture 
of iron to a gallon of drinking water. 
This keeps the bird healthy and strong. 
Take half lime and half sand, make a 
mush of it and spread it on a board to 
dry. When it is hard, place it in a box 
and leave it where your turkey hen 
can get it to eat at her own convenience. 
That helps to mature the eggs. She is 
very tender at this time. All through 
the laying season she must be kept 
warm and comfortable. It all goes to- 
wards making a successful season of 
turkey raising. 

Page thirty-seven 



MATING 

March is the proper time to mate up 
your pens of turkeys. I put one torn 
in a pen with eight hens. I watch my 
turkey hens very closely to see that they 
are not injured in any way by the spurs 
of the torn. If the turkey hen goes 
around with one wing down, you will 
know that she has been hurt, and if you 
take her up you will probably find that 
her side has been torn by the torn. 
Wash her carefully with a disinfectant, 
and if the wound needs a stitch it had 
better be taken as it will heal quicker: 

FEEDING DURING BREEDING SEASON 

In February and March do not feed 
your turkey hens too rich food or too 
many beef scraps or food of any kind 
that will force the hens to lay too early. 
You do not want any young chicks 
hatched out before the first of May or 

Page thirty-eight 



the last of April. When my turkey 
hens start to lay I feed a ground feed 
that is put up under my formula by 
The Park & Pollard Company of Bos- 
ton, Mass., which they are putting out 
under the name of Margaret Mdhaney 
Turkey Feed, and which can be pro- 
cured of them all ready for feeding. 
Have plenty of beef scraps and oyster 
shells within easy reach. Twice a week 
put tincture of iron in the drinking 
water, four drops to a gallon of water; 
allow one gallon of water to each pen. 
The tincture of iron keeps the birds 
strong and in good condition, as a young 
turkey hen is very apt to weaken after 
her first litter of eggs is laid. Some- 
times they die if not properly cared for. 
Keep on hand within easy reach, con- 
stantly, a mixture of half sand and half 
lime made into a soft mush. When 
dry crumble up and leave it where your 

Page thirty-nine 



turkeys can get it to eat. They will 
eat this ravenously and it helps to 
harden the shells of the eggs. 

NESTS AND NESTING 

When the turkey hen is ready to lay 
she will start in first by looking in all 
the corners, for if she is yarded up, it 
is her nature to look for a dark and 
secluded spot in which to lay. I place 
to eight turkey hens four good dark 
nests. I make these by using packing 
cases with the cover on and the opening 
turned towards the wall of the house, 
allowing just enough room for the bird 
to enter. I put good, clean hay in the 
box. The turkey hen will be very 
happy when she finds that nobody can 
see her in her nest. It will make her 
very contented, and as we are now 
breeding turkeys in the domestic state, 
almost the same as the common hen, 

Page forty 



why not give them just the same care? 
You will find in the long run that you 
will raise many more turkeys if a tur- 
key hen is properly housed and kept 
warm during the cold months of win- 
ter. The turkey hen begins to grow 
her eggs three months before she begins 
to lay, and as we all know that the tur- 
key is a very cold bird, it is only nat- 
ural that she should be kept warm. 
My houses are comfortable, tight and 
dry, but well ventilated from the south 
side. 

When the turkey hen has laid about 
eighteen or nineteen eggs she will show 
signs of wanting to sit. Very quietly 
take her off the nest, remove her to an- 
other coop, give her a good range to run 
in with plenty of Margaret Mahaney 
Turkey Feed. In the meantime set the 
eggs under two good common hens. I 
find that Plymouth Rocks make good 

Page forty-one 



mothers. I put eleven or twelve eggs 
under a good Plymouth Rock hen, and 
make a good round nest in a half bushel 
box, stuffing the corners well so that the 
nest will stay in shape, as a good nest is 
half the hatching. In the meantime the 
turkey hen having had her run has for- 
gotten all about sitting, and has started 
to laying again and I put her back in 
the mating pen. This process can be 
repeated three times during the season 
as a turkey hen will lay three litters in 
succession. I let my turkey hens sit 
on my June eggs and these hatch about 
the tenth or eleventh of July. These 
make good hardy birds for the coming 
cold weather. Disinfect the hen with 
Margaret Mahaney Salve, per direc- 
tions, before setting on the eggs. 

HATCHING 

To go back to the hatching of the 
turkeys; the eggs that are right under 

Page forty-two 



the breast of the hen will hatch first. 
Sometimes I do not wait for them all to 
come out of the shell, taking them away, 
say four or five at a time, thus giving 
the outside eggs a chance to hatch. 
The eggs which I take away I put in an 
incubator which has previously been 
regulated to the right heat. When they 
are all hatched, I have my coop well 
whitewashed and about six inches of 
good clean straw on the bottom. I place 
my biddy in the coop and put the little 
turkeys all around her. Be very care- 
ful in giving them drink or water that 
the little turkeys do not get wet, for 
they often take cold in that way. 

FIRST FEED 

The first feed that I give them is com- 
mon sting nettle, chopped fine, with a 
hard boiled egg and a little shake of red 
pepper. You will find that they will 

Page forty-three 



eat the green stuff ravenously, and this 
acts on the bowels as a regular physic. 
When they are three days old I begin 
feeding them the prepared ground feed, 
— Margaret Mahaney Turkey Feed — 
with a little wheat bread soaked in milk, 
squeezed dry and mixed with the egg 
and nettle. As The Park & Pollard 
Company carry this ground feed it can 
be easily had there. I keep this always 
before them. In the morning I give 
them nothing but the Margaret Ma- 
haney Turkey Feed with a good feed 
of lettuce. At night I give them the 
sting nettle again with bread soaked 
in milk and squeezed dry and a little 
chopped onion, if convenient. You will 
find that the birds you feed the sting 
nettle to will throw the red three weeks 
before the ones that do not have it fed 
to them. 

Page forty- four 



AVOID VERMIN 

When the little chicks first come out, 
before you put them in the coop, you 
must remember to disinfect ^ith my 
salve on the head and under tl vings ; 
also give the foster mother the same 
treatment with the salve, for if there 
are vermin on the hen they will leave 
the hen and go to the little turkeys 
and unless cared for the little birds 
will sicken and die. If affected with 
lice the bodies will become very red and 
irritated. You will find the lice espe- 
cially under the wings or in the fringe 
of the wings. When the feathers do 
not grow evenly on a little turkey (some 
growing long while others are short) 
you will know that the turkey has lice, 
and you should at once "get busy." 
One or two doses of my salve will make 
a marked improvement. I always dis- 
infect the hen when I put her on the 

Page forty-five 



eggs, but never disinfect her after the 
fifteenth day for at that time there is 
life in the chick, and you are very apt 
to kill it, as they breathe through the 
air cells of the egg. 

THE SETTING OF THE TURKEY HEN 

In the wild state the hen seeks the 
most secluded and inaccessible spot 
where there is protection from birds 
and beasts of prey. Security against 
attack is the main thing instinct 
prompts her to look out for. A tangled 
thicket of briars, a sheltering ledge, a 
hollow stump, a clump of brush filled 
with decaying leaves suits her fancy. 
With little preparation she drops her 
eggs on the bare ground in these se- 
cluded places. Domestic turkeys are 
usually allowed a good deal of freedom 
in choosing their nests. I generally set 
them the same as I do the common hen. 

Page forty-sir 



A half bushel basket is a comfortable 
nest for a turkey hen, and will give 
plenty of room for fifteen or eighteen 
eggs. 

Turkeys require a good deal of atten- 
tion while they are on the nests. They 
should be in one yard or building, or at 
least, not far distant from one another 
that it may take as little time as pos- 
sible to make the frequent visits neces- 
sary to each. Give the eggs room and 
have the nest deep enough to prevent 
their rolling out of the nest. A turkey 
hen will lay from fifteen to thirty eggs 
at a litter, but she cannot always cover 
the whole lot. Very large old birds 
will cover twenty eggs; smaller birds 
will cover from fifteen to eighteen 
which is about the proper number to 
allow one bird to take care of. 

If you have a dozen turkey hens in 
your flock, — which is about the right 

Page forty-seven 



number for a good range, — it will not 
be difficult to set several birds at once, 
and this may be arranged by placing 
the nests containing artificial eggs 
within a few feet of each other. You 
can keep part of the hens upon their 
nests a few days until three or four are 
ready to sit. Then select eggs of as 
near equal age as possible and put them 
under the hens that are sitting persist- 
ently. If the hens close together are 
not set at the same time, there is danger 
when the first begins to hatch that her 
neighbor will hear the peep of the first 
chick and perhaps forsake her nest. If 
all the group of three or four nests are 
hatching at the same time, there is no 
trouble of this kind. 

Before putting the eggs in the nest it 
is well to disinfect the hen with turkey 
salve under her wings. It will prevent 
vermin of any kind. 

Page forty-eight 



If any of the eggs get fouled with the 
yolk of a broken egg before or after 
setting, the shells should be carefully 
cleaned with warm water to secure 
their hatching. Two or three turkeys 
will sometimes lay in the same nest. 
This will do no harm in the early part 
of the season, but they should be sep- 
arated before setting, allowing only one 
bird to a nest. This may be done by 
making nests nearby and putting porce- 
lain eggs into each new nest. Turkeys 
are not liable to crowd onto an occupied 
nest when there is a vacant one nearby. 
The group of hens that sit together, 
and bring off their young at the same 
time, will naturally feed and ramble to- 
gether, and this will save time in look- 
ing after them. 

The turkey is a close sitter and will 
not leave her nest for several days at 
a time. Grain and water should be kept 

Page forty-nine 



near the nest all the time. When the 
turkeys begin to hatch I take the little 
chicks out just the same as I do when 
under a common hen, and give the ones 
that are not hatched a chance to do so. 

When they are all ready to go into the 
coop, I lift the hen very gently and car- 
ry her to the coop, generally putting 
the little turkeys into the coops first as 
the turkey hen is a very nervous bird 
and will scratch around and sometimes 
walk on the little birds. 

That is why I like to have them good 
and strong before they go into the coop 
with the mother. The little fellows 
seem to understand that the mother 
should not step on them for they will 
crowd over towards the side of the coop 
out of her reach. She will soon get 
used to them and to being fed and will 
settle down to taking care of her babies 
in good shape, as the turkey hen is a 

Page fifty 



very devoted mother. She will watch 
out for those who feed her and take care 
of her little babies. They will run to 
meet me when they see me coming, that 
is, of course, if they are out in the field. 
I have had them come home themselves 
when I let them out for a ramble, and 
when I have gone to feed them the 
mother would be in the coop with all 
her little babies. 

I give the same treatment to the tur- 
key chicks that are brought up by their 
mother as I do when they are brought 
up by a common hen, only the common 
hen will leave them long before the tur- 
key hen will think of forsaking her 
babies. I have gone into the turkey 
house when they were five or six months 
old and would find a young turkey pul- 
let nestling close to her mother. You 
do not find this in any other domestic 
bird that I know of. 

Page fifty-one 



THE THROWING OF THE RED 
AND YOUNG TURKEYS 



I knew what to feed to them, I have had 
them linger along up until seven or 
eight weeks, and at the end of that time, 
they would usually die. What had 
happened was that the blood had re- 
turned to the liver, become stagnant 
and caused diarrhea, which, of course, 
caused the death of the young turkey. 
When a young turkey is in good condi- 
tion it ought to shoot the red from the 
beginning to the end in ten days. Of 
course it will not be as prominent as in 
a larger bird. As the bird grows, the 
red becomes more apparent. 

When the little turkey is about four 
weeks old the feathers will begin to fall 
from the head some. Then you will 
know that the critical time is at hand. 
The little bird begins to shoot the red. 
It mopes around sometimes for days. 
There will be nothing wrong with him 
except that he just does not feel well. 

Page fifty-six 



Give plenty of sting nettle and a little 
tincture of iron three times a week (4 
drops of tincture of iron to a gallon of 
drinking water) and you will see an 
improvement in a couple of days. 

The young toms are much stronger 
than the pullets. Some of them will 
shoot the red and grow splendidly all 
through it with no signs of any droop- 
ing whatever, but there is always a 
marked change in the little pullets. 

After the red is grown, the secret of 
success in turkeys is to keep them 
growing. You can give them all the 
skimmed milk and all the sour milk they 
will drink. Feed them all the lettuce 
they can eat three times a day with net- 
tle in the feed, if you have it on the 
place. It is one of the necessities in 
raising turkeys that you keep the liver 
clean and if you feed lettuce two or 

Page fifty-seven 



three times a day, the droppings will be 
a bright green and in good condition. 

For my birds I have large runs, 6 ft. 
each way, which makes a good square 
run. I move the runs every day to 
clean ground; the straw is taken out 
and aired. If it is damp weather, put 
clean straw in at least every other day. 
My coops are high and well ventilated 
at the top which takes off all the hot and 
impure air, and helps keep the little 
turkeys strong and healthy. I allow 
about ten runs out at a time consisting 
of ten birds each and let them go for a 
good long ramble. They do not stay 
away from their houses very long, how- 
ever, but soon get tired and come back, 
usually staying out about two hours. 
Then I put them in their coops and 
let out about ten more runs. When I 
put them back into the coops I feed 
them lettuce and clean drinking water. 

Page fifty-eight 



(I continue this process until I have 
let out the entire flock.) I let out so 
many runs at a time so there will be 
no confusion in putting them in. I do 
this daily, every fair day, until the tur- 
key is four or five months old. Then 
I let them all out together. I put them 
in larger houses every night, keep them 
good and warm, with good roosts and 
clean straw, and I have very little 
trouble from disease. 

Every turkey should be allowed out 
for a while each day if the weather is 
fine and there are no signs of rain. 
If it is lowery or dark, do not let them 
out until the weather is pleasant again. 
This method of letting them out keeps 
them growing rapidly and makes them 
very tame so that they can be handled 
much more easily. 

Why not give a turkey the same care 
that we give a hen. People tell me 

Page fifty-nine 



many ways in which their turkeys are 
neglected. They seem to think that 
they do not need to look after turkeys 
and after they are hatched they turn 
them out and let them wander and for- 
age for themselves. The time of that 
kind of treatment for turkeys is past. 
Remember we are raising turkeys now 
by the approved methods and full feed- 
ing applied to modern poultry raising. 
People will come to me and tell me that 
their turkey hens are roosting out in the 
trees nights when it is below zero. As 
I have stated before, if it is in January 
these turkey hens are beginning to grow 
eggs. What vitality is there back of 
eggs grown under conditions of that 
kind? None whatever. 

On hot days you must cover the runs 
with burlap or shade of some descrip- 



Page sixty 



tion. I use the burlap sacks in which I 
receive dried bread waste that I buy. 

With reference to feeding bread, be 
sure never to feed bread that is mouldy 
for if you do you will start diarrhea in 
the young turkeys in no time. 

When fall is coming on you must be 
very careful of the pullets. As I said 
before, they are much more subject to 
blackhead than are the toms. When I 
house them up, — that is, in large 
houses, say forty or fifty to one pen, I 
have my prepared feed for turkeys 
(Margaret Mahaney Turkey Feed) 
before the pullets all the time. The 
less corn you give any turkey hen the 
less trouble you will have from black- 
head, for corn is heating. To keep the 
pullets in good condition you will find 
all the ingredients in this prepared 
feed, which is put up and sold now by 
The Park & Pollard Company, 46 Canal 

Page sixty-one 



Street, Boston, under the name of 
Margaret Mahaney Turkey Feed. 

Give more or less whole corn to the 
toms if you want to get them in good 
condition for shipping or for dressing 
around Thanksgiving. They do not 
fatten up as quickly as the turkey hen, 
which is the reason I keep all corn and 
corn meal away from the turkey hens. 

Put one-half teaspoonful of salicy- 
late of soda in the drinking water in 
each pan at night. In the mornings 
give them fresh water and twice a week 
place in it a little tincture of iron (4 
drops to each gallon of water). Do 
this up to about January, and then, if 
your turkey hens are kept warm and 
comfortable, they are over the dangers 
of the blackhead season. 

Give the same treatment to the young 
toms. 

Page sixty-two 



INVESTIGATION OF DISEASES 



The small number of diseases which 
are liable to be confused makes it com- 
paratively easy to form the right con- 
clusion by eliminating from the pos- 
sible list those that do not show the par- 
ticular symptoms of the other diseases. 

A general knowledge of the organ- 
ism, habits, and appearance of turkeys 
when in health is, of course, very desir- 
able. A reasonably close observation 
is about all we can expect in this mat- 
ter from the ordinary owner of a large 
flock of turkeys. The experienced fan- 
cier adds to this a frequent handling 
and more detailed study to learn the 
normal hardness and suppleness of the 
flesh and the warmth, moisture and col- 
or of the skin, especially about the vent, 
and the outline and structure of the 
skeleton. It is also eminently desirable 
that one know what is a right condition 
of all the organs, but this is particularly 

Page sixty-six 



true in respect to the liver and other di- 
gestive organs. 

One of the most common mistakes in 
the discovery of a disease is the forming 
of a decision after too little study. 
Finding one or two symptoms which are 
known to attend a suspected ailment, 
one is prone to jump at the conclusion 
that he has detected the real difficulty, 
when a further investigation would re- 
veal other symptoms, which, in conjunc- 
tion with these, would lead to the true 
conclusion. Every examination, there- 
fore, should be thorough until a degree 
of certainty is felt. It is essential, too, 
that the raiser not expect that the dis- 
ease will invariably present just the 
symptoms mentioned in any book, for 
they will vary more or less in different 
turkeys, and even in the same one at 
different times, — a caution which mere- 
Pa^ sixty-seven 



ly calls for the exercise of judgment and 
common sense. 

When any doubt is felt on the conta- 
gious nature of a disease, the affected 
turkey should be removed from the 
flock until the possible danger is passed. 
When a bird dies from an unknown 
cause, it should be opened and the con- 
dition of the internal organs noted, 
along with a study of their condition as 
taken up in the following pages of treat- 
ment. 

In general, it may be observed that 
the presence of lice and mites is often 
the cause of weakness and loss of condi- 
tion, especially if the turkeys are al- 
lowed to roost with the common hens. 



Page sixty-eight 



BLACKHEAD 



BLACKHEAD 

A GREAT many people write to 
me, saying that they lose their 
pullets and young turkeys after they 
have grown the first feathers. I never 
lose a turkey at that time. I grow my 
turkeys in runs as you would chickens 
and it is a beautiful sight to see well 
onto three hundred healthy, strong tur- 
keys in runs placed side by side. I 
never have any trouble with my young 
turkeys. As I said before in another 
part of my work, blackhead never ap- 
pears in my flock until the turkey is six 
and seven months old. When I see any 
signs of blackhead, I move all my tur- 
keys to new ground, disinfect all my 
coops with Presto Disinfectant, and 

Page seventy-one 



start in to cure my blackhead, as de- 
scribed on page 79. I wait for a wet 
day, and put lime on the ground that I 
moved the coops from, as turkeys are 
very apt to return to their old dwelling 
place. In that way, I keep down black- 
head. It is a very simple disease if 
taken in time and easily cured. 

When I first started raising turkeys, 
my little pullets died after they were 
feathered and about seven or eight 
weeks old. Some of them would not 
shoot the red until they were weighing 
two and a half pounds. Their heads 
would be dark, and their steps slow and 
dragging. As I said before, the blood 
lay dormant in the liver, and thus start- 
ed blackhead. If a turkey does not 
throw the red, when seven or eight 
weeks old, on close examination it will 
be found that the abdomen is dark and 
of a bluish cast. The flesh is not in 

Page seventy-two 



good condition, whereas in a young 
healthy turkey that has thrown the red 
at that age, the flesh will be pure and 
white. 

MY FIRST SUCCESSFUL FIGHT AGAINST 
BLACKHEAD 

When I first started to raise turkeys, 
and one came down with blackhead, I 
thought that there was no cure for her. 
I did all I possibly could, and if she died, 
I judged that she had to and that there 
was absolutely nothing that could be 
done to prevent it. 

One year I brought two handsome 
pullets in from Kentucky. They were 
fine, strong handsome birds, well 
marked, with splendid barrings, and a 
beautiful bronze. I grew extremely 
fond of them. When the spring of the 
year came on, about the last of March, 
around laying time, one of those two 

Page seventy-three 



birds came down with blackhead and I 
determined that I would make a fight 
for her life. 

She was an extremely sick bird. I 
took her into the house, placed her in 
the back hall, in a cast-off oval shaped 
clothes basket. I put soft burlap un- 
der her and wrapped her up warmly. 
I had a good knowledge of homeopathic 
remedies, and I started to cure bowel 
and liver troubles. The fever I kept 
down with aconite by giving a drop in 
a little water every hour. I stayed by 
the side of that turkey all night long. 
There were times when she would 
scream with pain, and then I placed 
her feet in water as hot as she could 
bear it with plenty of mustard in it, 
and allowed the water to come up as 
high as the first joint of her legs. I 
allowed her to stand in that about ten 
minutes at a time, and then I dried 
her feet and legs and placed her back 
in the basket. She would be very weak 

Page seventy-four 



after this treatment, but seemed easier. 
At other times she would become weak 
and lifeless, and I would then take her 
up in my arms, go out-of-doors and let 
her have the benefit of the cool air. The 
fight went on in this way until four 
o'clock in the morning, when she opened 
her eyes, raised her head, looked up at 
me and chirped a little. I decided then 
and there that there was such a thing 
as curing blackhead. 

I did not know then so much about 
the stoppage in the bowels. I did know, 
however, that nothing had passed 
through her bowels. I gave her a lit- 
tle warm whisky and milk, some more 
of my remedies, and then went for a 
couple of hours' rest myself. When I 
went to her again about two hours af- 
terward, the red had begun to flow back 
into her head, the fever had left her, 
and her pulse was normal. The pulse 

Page seventy-five 



of a turkey begins to beat just above the 
crop and in case of death, will gradual- 
ly creep up until, just before the breath 
leaves the bird, it will have reached a 
point under the throat. I kept the 
pulse in this bird down to the middle of 
the neck ; I never let it get any further. 
There were times when I had to place 
a cloth dipped in ice water on her head, 
but I was fighting for the life of my lit- 
tle pet, and she seemed to realize what 
I was doing. She was very weak all the 
morning. I took her up, placed her out 
on the lawn in the sun, and she stag- 
gered to her feet about twelve o'clock 
of that day, and then a solid core came 
from her bowels. This had lodged in 
the cecum. At that time I knew very 
little about this trait of the disease. 
Attached to the core was a part of the 
lining of the intestine. The turkey hen 
was very weak for days. One thing in 

Page seventy-six 




FRIENDS (MISS MAHANEY AND "GRANDMA CLEAVES") 



her favor was that she had an empty 
crop, and I immediately fed her a table- 
spoonful of cold water in which was 
dissolved four grains of common alum. 
That was given in order to form a skin 
and harden the sore and raw place in 
the bowel after the bird had passed the 
core. The turkey hen did not fully re- 
cover for three or four days. 

That turkey hen is about one of the 
best I have on my place. I call her 
Grandma Cleaves. The Agricultural 
colleges maintain that a bird that has 
once been afflicted with blackhead is un- 
fit for breeding stock. I have in my 
possession a young torn that was 
hatched out the fifteenth day of July, 
1912, by that bird. He weighs 31 lbs. 
and is well developed in every way. 
She laid three litters of eggs last sum- 
mer, and sat on the last litter, hatched 
twelve turkeys and raised eleven in that 

Page seventy-seven 



flock. In my opinion, a bird that has 
passed through blackhead is one of the 
best and strongest birds to breed from. 
I never had a bird come down the sec- 
ond season with blackhead. It is just 
like any other common fever that is 
contagious, and can afflict a person but 
once. 

After winning that fight, I made up 
my mind that something could be done 
for blackhead, and from that time on I 
have had great success in battling 
against this disease. 

My breeding grounds are not so far 
distant but that the people of Massa- 
chusetts can come to see me. I would 
be very glad to show them my runs and 
turkeys and my methods of breeding. 

TO DETECT BLACKHEAD 

Blackhead is the disease to be most 
dreaded by the turkey raisers in New 
England and all over the country. 

Page seventy-eight 



When you go into the turkey house 
in the morning, go directly to the drop- 
pings board and see if you find any 
yellow droppings. If you do, look care- 
fully over your flock. It will not take 
you long to discover the bird that has 
blackhead. The head is an unhealthy 
dusky gray, and the bird will mope 
around, apparently wanting to eat and 
yet not doing so. Then you can decide 
that you have blackhead in your flock. 

TREATMENT OF FULL GROWN TURKEYS 

Take that bird away immediately; 
disinfect her head and under the wings 
with salve; massage the crop gently to 
see if it is full of undigested food. If 
it is, give a scant half teaspoonful of 
Epsom salts in a little water. In about 
an hour's time give a tablespoonful of 
olive oil and follow with a quarter of 
a teaspoonful salicylate of soda in two 

Page seventy-nine 



tablespoonfuls of warm water. After 
the crop is emptied put her in a box, 
say a good sized packing case, with 
plenty of straw, and cover with burlap. 
Give a teaspoonf ul of warm whisky and 
a tablespoonful of milk mixed together. 
This will keep up the vitality of the 
bird. A long necked milk testing bottle 
comes in very handy in a flock of any 
kind of fowl, for you can place the neck 
down below the windpipe and inject 
the liquids into the crop without any 
choking on the part of the fowl. Then 
watch and see if the droppings are 
yellow. If they are give one of the 
Mahaney Blackhead pills every hour 
until the droppings become normal. 
You can place the pill on the tongue 
of the turkey and make her swallow it. 
If there is nothing in the crop except 
a brash of sour wind, give the pills and 
hot milk and whiskey at once. 

Page eighty 



Be sure to keep the bird warm for 
a few days, and then disinfect before 
she goes out with the rest of the flock. 
Look over the droppings board every 
morning and see if there are any yel- 
low droppings. Use plenty of lime. 
Twice a week, in the morning, give 
sulphate of iron, powdered (one level 
teaspoonful in a gallon of water in 
an earthen dish). The other days, at 
night, give salicylate of soda in the 
same amount in the drinking water. 
This will keep your flock in good con- 
dition. 

BLACKHEAD IN YOUNG TURKEYS 

The first symptom of blackhead in 
the young turkeys has the appearance 
of a common cold in the head. The 
turkey will sniff and water will some- 
times come from the nose. The loss of 
appetite is apparent. The wings droop 
and when you let the turkeys out of the 

Page eighty-one 



coops, the one affected will drag itself 
along behind the rest of the flock. I 
take that bird away from the rest. I 
disinfect the head and under the wings 
with my salve. Rub the salve lightly 
on the head. Hold the turkey gently 
across the back, press the wings down 
to the side. If you are not very gentle 
with them, and very careful, you are 
liable to break the wings. 

The moment you see one become life- 
less, with dragging steps and loss of 
appetite, disinfect the whole flock with 
the salve twice a week. Dissolve in an 
earthen dish four or five of the Mar- 
garet Mahaney Turkey Pills in a little 
warm water; then mix the solution in 
a quart of drinking water and give to 
the young turkeys to drink. This, re- 
peated every day, with the straw well 
aired and kept clean, and the coop dry 
and water-proof, will make them show 

Page eighty-two 





< 



WOMEN MAKE THE MOST SUCCESSFUL TURKEY RAISERS 



a marked improvement in three days. 
I never lose a young turkey. They 
thrive just as well as little chickens, 
and I think they are just as hardy. 

As vermin is one of the enemies of 
young turkeys, use the salve twice a 
week always, and use it in the morning. 
Do not shut them up after putting on 
my salve because it is very strong. Let 
it evaporate before the little chickens 
go to bed at night, and you will have 
no vermin. There is an old saying 
about a louse in the head of a turkey 
which enters the brain and causes 
blackhead. I know very well that that 
does not cause blackhead, as this dis- 
ease comes from a common cold, which 
descends to the bowels and liver and 
kills the turkey after a few days' suf- 
fering if not relieved. 



Page eighty-three 



STARTS WITH A COMMON COLD. 

Treatment of a Common Cold. 

Blackhead starts from a common 
cold. When you have a bird in your 
flock afflicted with a cold, place a small 
teaspoonful of Epsom salts to one gal- 
lon of water. Do this three or four 
days in succession and put plenty of 
lime around your turkey houses. I put 
lime on the droppings boards every 
day ; it will kill the disease in no time 
and do no injury to the turkey. Of 
course I put clean straw in my turkey 
house in damp weather every other day 
as the straw becomes damp and is very 
liable to breed disease. 

Give this Epsom salts treatment in 
the hot weather whether the birds show 
symptoms of disease or not. It keeps 
their blood cool and avoids the tendency 
to disease. 

The time for blackhead season is in 

Page eighty-four 



what is commonly called "dog days/' 
that is, mid-summer. The weather is 
heavy and dark and is very injurious 
to young turkeys. That is the time 
you must keep your coops good and dry 
and give plenty of green stuff, with 
aconite in the drinking water about 
twice a week to keep down any fever. 
Three drops in a pint of water is all I 
give them as aconite is very poisonous. 
If you have any sting nettle at the time 
be sure to feed it, as sting nettle is one 
of the greatest aids to success in raising 
young turkeys. 

When the turkey dies of blackhead 
the crop becomes apparently black and 
inflamed, and is very foul. The liver 
is enlarged, and has white or yellowish 
spots all over it. In some places it has 
the appearance of being eaten away. 
Underneath the liver, next to the back 
of the bird and around the heart you 

Page eighty-five 



will find a brownish substance, just the 
same as you would find in a person who 
dies from peritonitis. You will also 
find in what is called the second stom- 
ach, that is, the bowel leading to the 
gizzard, a large core. Sometimes this 
will be very dark brownish yellow or 
ochre color, mingled with blood. This 
core forms a stoppage, and unless it is 
removed, is certain death for the 
turkey. 

I have had turkeys die with what is 
commonly called in human beings, "ap- 
pendicitis," as the appendix was mat- 
terated and badly swollen. In fact, in 
a bad case of blackhead all the bowels 
of the turkey become swollen. The giz- 
zard is twice its natural size, the abdo- 
men becomes swollen and black and the 
odor is very obnoxious. In a bad case 
of this kind there is nothing that can 
be done, the disease having become too 

Page eighty-six 



far advanced, and that is why one ought 
to watch turkeys very closely. If the 
turkey is taken in time and Margaret 
Mahaney pills given, and the turkey 
is kept warm, (for they will take the 
disease first with a chill just the same 
as a human being would take malaria) 
there is no need of any loss in the flock 
from blackhead. All the colleges of 
agriculture have diagnosed the case as 
a parasite on the intestines, but I have 
thoroughly investigated that theory, 
and wish to say that I have found no 
grounds for such a belief. 



Page eighty-seven 



COMMON DISEASES 



COMMON DISEASES 

RHEUMATISM 

(Sometimes confused with Blackhead) 

I HAVE a great many people write 
me in regard to weak legs in tur- 
keys. Of course, this is common rheu- 
matism. The limbs suffer an impair- 
ment or loss of use, are hot, swollen and 
stiff. The toes then being drawn out 
of shape, the fowl persistently sits 
down and cannot use the perch. The 
heart may become involved and this 
produces death. I had it in my flock 
one year, — that is, I had several birds 
victims to the disease. They would 
squat down all the time. The breast 
bone grew all over to one side from sit- 
ting so much. They were fat and ap- 
parently healthy, except that they could 
not seem to stand up any length of 

Page ninety-one 



time. I bathed their feet with mus- 
tard and water as hot as I thought they 
could stand it. I saved most of them, 
but it seemed to me that they never 
could walk as well as the flock that had 
not been affected. The cause of this 
affliction is that the turkeys are allowed 
out too early in the morning when the 
dew is on the grass and allowed to roam 
around in damp places. At this time 
I was raising my flock on lowland. I 
have never had any of it in my flock 
since I moved to high and dry land. 
Give five drops of bryonia in a pint of 
drinking water to six turkeys. After 
using the mustard water be careful to 
wipe the turkey's legs dry and then rub 
well with camphorated oil the backs of 
the legs leading into the body. Keep 
in a warm and dry place and give sul- 
phur in the feed (about a half teaspoon- 
ful to four turkeys). 

Page ninety-two 



"ROTTEN CROP" SOMETIMES MISTAKEN 
FOR BLACKHEAD 

Another disease very common in tur- 
keys which is called blackhead and yet 
has nothing to do with blackhead, is 
what you would call "rotten crop" in a 
common hen. When this takes place 
the crop becomes very foul and heavy. 
The bird will drink water, which stays 
in the crop and becomes sour. I have 
often had to take the bird up, hold the 
head down and rub the crop gently so 
that all the water would run from the 
mouth. With the aid of a long neck 
milk testing bottle I fill the crop with 
warm water with a quarter teaspoon- 
ful baking soda in it, and relieve the 
crop by massaging the second time. 
Then I give a tablespoonful of olive oil. 
Put the bird away from the rest, with 
very little feed for a couple of days. 
I never have any difficulty in saving a 

Page ninety-three 



bird affected with what is commonly 
called "rotten crop." If not relieved, 
however, it will turn into blackhead and 
the turkey will die. 

COLD — CATARRH — COUGH — BRONCHITIS 

All of these are substantially differ- 
ent stages and symptoms of the same 
disorder. Exposure to wet and cold is 
the general cause. Cough is, indeed, a 
symptom, not a disease, and is connect- 
ed with the other three. It may, how- 
ever, attend other diseases, and when 
its cause is not known, the article 
pertaining to roup should especially 
be consulted. Bronchitis is but an 
advanced stage or aggravated form 
of cold or catarrh. The three are 
marked by more or less discharge from 
the eyes and nostrils, sneezing, wheez- 
ing, and, particularly in bronchitis, 
coughing and a rattling sound in the 
throat. To distinguish this from roup, 

Page ninety-four 



see whether the discharge is offensive. 
If it is, roup is to be treated; if not, 
catarrh or bronchitis. In all cases of 
doubt, use the precautions detailed for 
roup. 

Turkeys are subject to roup from the 
time they are babies, more so than com- 
mon hens, as a cold is the cause of all 
their trouble. 

Treatment: Remove the turkey to 
warm, dry shelter, and give warm, soft 
food. These measures will usually be 
sufficient, but the following will be val- 
uable as aids: For cold or catarrh 
merely, and no distinction between 
them is here made, put three drops of 
strong tincture of aconite in a pint of 
the drink. If there is a swelling about 
the throat, two or three grains of the 
second trituration of mercuries three 
times a day will be useful. For bron- 
chitis, in addition to the measures just 

Page ninety-five 



named, give sweetened water for the 
drink, adding a few drops of nitric acid 
or sulphuric acid. For both catarrh 
and bronchitis give some stimulant, 
such as ginger or cayenne pepper in 
the food or whisky in the water. Treat 
catarrh and cold promptly, to keep them 
from developing into roup. Do not 
neglect bronchitis lest it run into con- 
sumption. 

ROUP 
Roup is a highly contagious malady 
which first affects the lining membrane 
of the beak and then extends to the 
eyes, throat, and whole head, eventu- 
ally involving the entire constitution. 
According to its manifest symptoms, 
it has been called diphtheria, sore 
head, swelled eyes, hoarseness, bron- 
chitis, canker, snuffles, influenza, sore 
throat, quinsy, blindness, and by other 
names. It attacks all ages, and will 

Page ninety-six 



kill young turkeys in a very short time. 
Turkeys given poor shelter, and kept in 
filthy quarters, are subject to roup. 

Symptoms : — Roup develops either 
slowly or rapidly, with the general 
signs of a bad cold in the head, such 
as wheezing, or sneezing, high fever 
and great thirst. The discharge from 
the eyes and nose is yellowish, being at 
first thin but growing thicker as the 
disease develops, and very offensive, 
closing the eyes, nostrils and throat 
(these parts and the whole head are 
swollen, sometimes enormously, so that 
blindness ensues, making the turkey 
unable to get its food, and thus hasten- 
ing the decline of the system) ; pustu- 
lar sores about the head and in the 
throat, discharging a frothy mucus; 
the breathing is impeded; the crop is 
often swollen; the comb and wattles 
may be pale or dark-colored. During 

Page ninety-seven 



the course of the disease the turkey is 
feeble and moping. A fatal case termi- 
nates in from three to eight days 
after the distinctive roup-symptoms 
set in, and those which are not treated 
when an epidemic is prevailing will 
generally be fatal. Upon opening a 
turkey that has died of roup one will 
find the liver and gall bladder full of 
pus, the flesh soft, of a bad odor, and, 
particularly about the lungs, slimy and 
spongy. 

Treatment: — It is of the highest im- 
portance that the treatment begin as 
soon as the first symptoms appear. To 
detect the approach of the disease (and 
any turkey in the flock should be sus- 
pected if one has been infected), raise 
the wing and ascertain whether the 
feathers beneath it are stuck together, 
as the turkey has the habit of wiping 

Page ninety-eight 



its nose under the wings, and naturally 
the feathers will become matted and 
foul. 

Remove the turkey to a good warm 
place ; wash her head with warm water 
with a drop or two of sulpho-napthol 
in the water; dry well with a good soft 
cloth and rub Mahaney turkey salve on 
her head, throat and crop ; open up her 
beak and oil the inside of her mouth 
and throat well with the salve. A little 
swab can be made for that purpose. 
Give one of the Margaret Mahaney 
blackhead pills, three times a day, and 
make a pill as large as a good sized 
bean as follows: one-half mustard and 
one-half sulphur, equal parts. Give 
the turkey one of these pills every 
night, and if swollen eyes and head 
has prevented her from seeing her food, 
feed her a little bread and milk, soft 
and warm, until she is able to feed her- 

Page ninety-nine 



self. A drop or two of kerosene oil in 
the drinking water makes a good dis- 
infectant for turkeys. 

When a disease of this kind enters 
your turkey house disinfect your drop- 
pings boards, and feed five quarts of 
hot mash from Margaret Mahaney 
Turkey Feed with one or two onions 
chopped fine and put in the mash. A 
teaspoonful of red pepper also given 
to them every night before going to 
roost will help to prevent the disease 
from spreading. Keep your turkey 
house clean and dry, and if you see 
any sign of this disease, it is much bet- 
ter to remove the droppings every day, 
and if taken in time roup is not a fatal 
disease. 

CONSUMPTION OF THE THROAT 

The special symptoms of consumption 
of the throat are a frequent cough, 

Page one hundred 



roughness of the voice, and often a 
failure to partake of food either from 
loss of appetite or from pain caused 
by swallowing. Attacks of fever, fol- 
lowed by shivering, are more or less 
regular. For treatment keep the bird 
in a very warm atmosphere, chop up 
onions very fine and mix in the feed, 
also give a teaspoonf ul of olive oil three 
times a day with one to two drops of 
aconite to a cup of water. 

I generally have what is commonly 
called a hospital for sick birds ; that is, 
I set aside one coop, keep it warm and 
have it heated with an incubator lamp, 
a large one. The temperature should 
be kept around 70 degrees, until the 
bird ceases to cough. 

CONSUMPTION OF THE LUNGS 

A distinct feature of consumption of 
the chest or lungs is a tubercular de- 

Page one hundred one 



posit in the chest, liver and bowels. 
The first symptoms are a thinning of 
the voice and occasionally sneezing. 
When the sneezing comes on in the 
morning and continues during the day, 
the lungs have become involved, and 
eventually a puffed appearance will be 
manifest in the chest. Give the same 
treatment for consumption of the chest 
as given for consumption of the throat. 
Add a few drops of tincture of iron 
(four drops to a gallon of water) to 
the water each day until the appear- 
ance of the bird has improved. 

Light, ventilation and pure air are 
three of nature's most potent agencies 
in counteracting disease. Every tur- 
key should have a liberal allowance of 
sunlight, though the power and direct- 
ness of the rays should be determined 
by the climate, which is only natural. 
Among those that need frequent sun 

Page one hundred two 



baths are the wild birds of the air and 
as the turkey was originally a wild 
bird, in the very nature of things, it 
demands a great deal of sunlight. It 
makes no difference how hot the day is, 
the turkey will lie in the sun and seem 
to enjoy it when the temperature is) 
even up to 100 degrees. This is the 
reason I keep my turkeys warm and 
comfortable, as it is a preventive of 
consumption or any disease of that 
nature. 

A good dirt bath should be provided 
for a turkey all winter: light sand, 
half clay, with a measure of air-slacked 
lime. The turkey will wallow in that 
for an hour at a time, thoroughly enjoy 
it and seem so much brighter after it. 

If turkeys are allowed to run on the 
frozen ground and roost in the trees all 
winter, how can one reasonably expect 
them to remain in a healthy condition 

Page one hundred three 



when they positively need warm, com- 
fortable quarters? If suitable houses 
are provided for turkeys, warm, clean 
and comfortable with plenty of lime, 
grit and charcoal during the winter 
months, it will be found that there will 
be very little trouble with blackhead 
during the summer and consequently 
less tendency to consumption and other 
diseases in the colder months. 

SWOLLEN HEADS 

Swollen heads in turkeys seems to 
me to be the prevailing disease this 
spring of 1913. Complaints have come 
to me from all over the country, also 
sick birds have been sent to me to treat. 

I do not know whether it would be 
called roup or canker, but the appear- 
ance of it is that of a common cold, a 
watery discharge from the nose, eyes 
half closed, and sometimes wholly 

Page one hundred four 



closed, with a large projecting forma- 
tion in the orbital cavity under the 
eyes, which, if left there, will cause the 
death of the turkey after the turkey 
loses its sight. Press your hand gently 
on the formation. If the formation 
has not become hard, but is still in a 
spongy condition, press firmly on both 
sides of the nose under the eyes, and 
force out the thick, foul discharge 
which has gathered. Wash the head 
with Sulpho-Napthol or Presto Disin- 
fectant, dry well, and then disinfect 
with my salve. Repeat this every day 
until the turkey is well. In the mean- 
time the turkey will have a little hack- 
ing cough that is caused by a watery 
discharge from the head, which flows 
down inside the nose and drops on to 
the windpipe. A human being has a 
chance to relieve the head and throat, 
but the turkey does not have this ad- 
vantage. 

Page one hundred five 



If, however, the formation in the 
orbital cavity has become hard, an 
operation is necessary. Have some 
one hold the bird gently on its side, 
with its wings close to the body in nat- 
ural form, for in the struggle, the bird 
is very apt to break its wing. Wash 
the head with Sulpho-Napthol or Presto 
Disinfectant and dry well. Have ready 
a good sharp operating knife, thor- 
oughly sterilized, and also sterilize your 
hands. About one-fourth inch below 
the eye you will find one or two leaders. 
You must try to avoid cutting through 
these. Always try to avoid cutting 
through any veins. Make a clean cut 
about one-half inch in length, running 
straight down the orbital cavity to the 
beak so that when it heals up it will 
leave no scar. If the turkey is in good 
blood and a male bird, they are very 
apt to bleed quite a little. I would then 

Page one hundred six 



stop the blood with cotton batten, or by- 
bathing with water mixed with a little 
alum. Leave the bird for that day. 
The next morning open up the cut, 
take out the canker, which you will 
find to be a yellow, cheesy substance, 
with a very bad odor. Remove all 
this canker, wash out the cavity with 
peroxide of hydrogen, dry well, fill 
the cavity with Margaret Mahaney 
Salve, which keeps the head soft and 
clean. Wash the head lightly for a few 
days. When the wound heals up you 
will find a sort of dry core in the 
wound. Remove this, wash out, and 
your turkey is all well. Trust the rest 
to nature. 

If you find that the lump under the 
eye has become hard and white before 
you operate, and that the blood has 
flowed back from the head, there is no 

Page one hundred seven 



need of waiting for the wound to stop 
bleeding. You can remove the canker 
at once.* 

In the meantime, in the feed put a 
half teaspoonf ul of sulphur each morn- 
ing for a week in a warm mush made 
from Margaret Mahaney Turkey Feed. 
This will keep the bowels in good con- 
dition, and hasten the recovery of the 
turkey. 

This canker is sometimes found in 
the rectum of the turkey. Syringe the 
bird with warm water in which has 
been dissolved a little piece of Castile 
soap. Add to one quart of water a 
half teaspoonf ul of boric acid, and after 
the bird has been thoroughly washed 
out, wash again with the above solu- 

*For the operation above described I have been 

.jtf W ii i k^JigjiSUJBJaHl using of late, and can- 
WJrffpffif^lTTppff not recommend too 
highly, a knife which may be procured at Park & 
Pollard's, called a Killing Knife. 

Page one hundred eight 



tion. Dry the vent thoroughly and 
sponge on a little sweet oil. Do this 
for a few days with sulphur in the feed, 
and you will find that the bird will be 
all right. Use about % teaspoonful of 
sulphur to y 2 pint of feed. 

SORE EYES AND HEAD 

The eyes may become sore from 
dust, excessive heat, dampness and 
other causes, and give out a watery 
discharge. The whole head may be- 
come involved in the inflammation. 
Such mild afflictions are to be distin- 
guished from canker and roup, but it 
is always safe to keep a sharp lookout 
for the latter when the eyes are sore. 

Wash the parts with a weak solution 
of white vitriol (sulphate of zinc) or 
with alum-water, or with a solution of 
alum and camphor. If the discharge 
has become gummy or hardened, re- 
move it with warm water and Castile 

Page one hundred nine 



soap, followed with alum and water. 
Dry the head well with a soft cloth, 
and then rub gently with Margaret 
Mahaney Turkey Salve, as it con- 
tains all the ingredients that heal and 
cleanse. 

To about four turkeys put one-half 
teaspoonful of sulphur in the feed with 
a shake of red pepper three or four 
times a week, and a little tincture of 
iron in the water (about four drops to 
a gallon of water) . 

CONSTIPATION IN TURKEYS 

Constipation is caused by indiges- 
tion, taking cold, too close confinement, 
too much dry feed and too little green, 
a deficient supply of good water and 
the like. It is indicated by frequent 
attempts to evacuate the bowels, either 
wholly unsuccessful or resulting only 
in hard, dark droppings. The turkey 
is uneasy and perhaps staggers. 

Page one hundred ten 



Give an abundance of green food and 
a soft mixture of bran and oatmeal and 
ten drops of sulphate of magnesia to a 
pint of the drinking water. Along with 
these directions for the feed, it will be 
well to give two drops of aconite to a 
half glass of water, giving the bird a 
teaspoonful of the solution every hour 
until the fever disappears, following 
this with a solution made of two drops 
of nux vomica to a half glass of water, 
giving a teaspoonful of the solution 
every hour until well, or if a cold is the 
cause, use two drops of bryonia in the 
water instead of the nux vomica. I 
have often had this disease in my 
flock when the turkeys are about three 
months old, just before I let them out 
for a good day's ramble, so that is why 
I always recommend plenty of good let- 
tuce. It keeps the bow T els in good con- 
dition, keeps the intestines cool, and 
makes up itself for all fever remedies. 

Page one hundred eleven 



DIARRHEA. 

This disease is often mistaken for 
blackhead in grown turkeys. It may 
result from an excessive use of tainted 
food, mouldy bread or mouldy grain, 
impure water, extreme heat, exposure 
in damp weather, filthy quarters and 
general indigestion, poison, or any in- 
flammatory affliction of the intestines or 
the stomach. 

The symptoms are loose droppings 
of different colors which befoul the 
feathers, lassitude, and a loss of condi- 
tion. In dysentery which results from 
a diseased condition of the intestines, 
the droppings are more frothy and 
mingled with blood, and attended with 
rapid prostration. 

A form of diarrhea essentially dif- 
ferent from the two described, occurs 
in an old female turkey in which a 
white discharge comes away more or 

Page one hundred twelve 



less constantly, often dribbling out, and 
keeps the feathers about the vent in- 
crusted with a white, chalk-like deposit 
It is doubtless due to some derangement 
in the shell-making function, and can 
best be treated by promoting the gen- 
eral health and using the means noted 
below. 

Treatment: Have your pharmacist 
make up pills made of a mixture of five 
grains of powdered chalk, five of rhu- 
barb, and five of cayenne pepper, add- 
ing a half grain of opium in severe 
cases. Give two pills daily. Another 
good remedy is camphorated spirits of 
barley meal, three to six grains for each 
bird according to age, or ten to twenty 
drops of the same may be put in a pint 
of the drink. For mild cases and in 
the early stages of others, powdered 
chalk on boiled rice may be sufficient. 
The remedy last named is recommended 

Page one hundred thirteen 



for the white discharge of old females, 
for which the pills described above 
should be used as well as a little lime 
water, made by allowing about % tea- 
spoonful air-slacked lime to % pint 
water for a bird. Dissolve and then 
pour off the liquid for them to drink 
instead of plain water. 

Restrict the drink in all forms of 
these disorders and put into it a little 
tincture of iron (four drops to a gal- 
lon of water). 

Dysentery with blood discharges is 
a serious disorder. It is best to give a 
teaspoonful of castor oil, followed with 
three to six drops of laudanum every 
few hours, supplying an exclusive diet 
of mild food. It is important that the 
afflicted bird be kept quiet and apart 
from the flock, especially in dysentery. 

Isolate the afflicted bird when you 
are at all doubtful regarding the nature 

Page one hundred fourteen 



of the disorder. Give a couple of table- 
spoonfuls of ground chalk to a pint of 
warm mash made from Margaret Ma- 
haney Turkey Feed. This will also 
be found beneficial at any time to the 
laying turkey hens of five or six years 
old. Allow one pint of mash to four 
turkeys three times a day. A little 
camphor, about the size of a good sized 
bean, to four turkeys will hasten the 
recovery ; dropped in the drinking water 
once a week, will help to keep the birds 
in good laying condition. 

Diarrhea in Little Turkeys 
Diarrhea in a little turkey is white, 
something the same as that trouble in 
a common chicken, and if you look very 
carefully you will see that the little legs 
are dotted with white, and the little 
turkeys will be lifeless and not appear- 
ing to thrive. That is the time to give 
them Mahaney pills (four to a quart 

Page one hundred fifteen 



of drinking water for 10 or 11 young 
turkeys). Boil a piece of meat, grind 
fine, and put in the feed, and that will 
help them get back their vitality. A 
drop of aconite in the drinking water 
on damp days will help to prevent fever 
of any kind. 

GAPES 

There are many remedies for gapes, 
but the following is always beneficial 
and dependable. It manifests itself 
first by the birds gaping around just 
as a person would yawn. 

Fill a common, long-necked oil can 
such as is used for oiling a sewing ma- 
chine, with kerosene oil; open the tur- 
key's mouth and wait until it breathes 
in order that the windpipe may be open, 
then inject a good spray of the kerosene, 
perhaps a teaspoonful in all. Three 
doses will usually cure the turkeys of 
the gape worm. Give treatment three 

Page one hundred sixteen 



times a day, in the morning, at noon 
and night. Shut the turkeys up in 
their run for about a week, then move 
them to new ground. 

TAPE WORM 

The tape worm is an entirely differ- 
ent thing and is rather more serious, 
and will produce substantially the same 
symptoms as indigestion. If they are 
in the bowels, costiveness or diarrhea 
may be more marked, while the turkey 
will be uneasy and picking at the vent 
if they are in the lower part of the in- 
testine. In all cases there will be more 
or less loss of flesh and often diminished 
gloss in the feathers, while the bird has 
either an impaired or a voracious appe- 
tite. The only unmistakable symptom 
is the presence of worms in the drop- 
pings when they first pass out. 

An unhealthy condition of the diges- 
tive organs is the main cause. The 

Page one hundred seventeen 



treatment for this is a teaspoonful of 
castor oil followed by a light addition 
of sulphur to the feed, and this may 
expel the worms and restore the gen- 
eral health. A little cayenne pepper in 
the feed and tincture of iron in the 
water will aid the cure. The use of 
four drops of oil of ferm to a table- 
spoonful of water is beneficial in a case 
of this kind. Give in the morning be- 
fore the bird has eaten anything. 

I had one bird this last year which 
had a tape worm. I noticed the worm 
in the droppings first. I took the bird 
away and put her on a board floor and 
gave her a good dose of castor oil. She 
had only passed half of the worm at one 
time, and I watched her very closely 
until she passed the head. 

In a case of tape worm the droppings 
will be more or less white and limy. A 
turkey requires a great deal of lime. 

Page one hundred eighteen 



I have even seen turkeys pick at an 
old wall where it had been plastered. 
Lime, mixed with sand, should be left 
in all the corners of the farm for tur- 
keys to eat, as it is a sure preventive of 
worms. 

PERITONITIS 

Peritonitis in turkeys is often mis- 
taken for blackhead. It is a very diffi- 
cult disease to treat, and it is only with 
the milder cases that success can rea- 
sonably be expected. The affected bird 
must be kept quiet, protected from any 
current of air, and opium in doses of 
one (1) grain every four hours is 
recommended to quiet the pain and 
reduce the movement of the intestines, 
or mix three or four drops of aconite 
in a half glass of water and give a tea- 
spoonful three or four times a day. In- 
jections of tepid water are recommend- 
ed to counteract constipation. Take a 

Page one hundred nineteen 



hot water bag. Do not have the water 
so hot that it would be uncomfortable 
for the turkey; wring a flannel out of 
warm water and lay it over the hot 
water bag, and then place the bag 
against the wall of the abdomen. Re- 
new them as often as necessary to keep 
up a moist heat. This treatment should 
be continued from a half hour to an 
hour. Repeat three or four times a 
day, drying the surface of the wall 
afterwards so that the bird will not 
take cold. If there is a great weak- 
ness, one or two drops of ether, or four 
or five drops of tincture of camphor 
may be injected under the skin as a 
stimulant. 

In case the disease is due to rupture 
of the oviduct or perforation of the 
intestine, treatment is useless ; if it has 
followed inflammation of the intestine, 
the treatment for enteritis should be 
combined with that for peritonitis. 

Page one hundrea 1 twenty 



On opening the abdominal cavity of 
a turkey which has died from peri- 
tonitis, the lining membrane is found 
to be a deep red in color, and is some- 
times covered by an exudate, which 
may consist of a thin, transparent 
layer, or it may be thick yellowish or 
reddish yellow. The abdomen may 
contain more or less liquid which may 
be transparent or it may be turbid 
with a yellow or reddish color. If the 
trouble is due to the perforation of the 
intestine, the liquid will have a very 
offensive odor from the multiplication 
of the putrefactive germs. If it has 
resulted from the rupture of the ovi- 
duct, the egg, either intact or broken, 
will generally be found in the abdom- 
inal cavity, and the ruptured place in 
the wall of the oviduct is easily dis- 
covered. 

Page one hundred twenty-one 



The writer had two cases of peri- 
tonitis in her flock of turkey hens just 
around the laying season. One died 
and the other I succeeded in saving by 
the breaking of the bound egg and 
washing out the rectum with a syringe. 
For a wash of this kind four or five 
drops of iodine should be added. It is 
good to relieve pain and acts as a stim- 
ulant for the bird. The bird must be 
kept very warm and comfortable after 
a thing of that kind for three or four 
days. It is well to feed the bird on 
stimulating food and keep her away 
from the breeding pens until she re- 
covers her strength. 



Page one hundred twenty-two 



THE BRONZE TURKEY 



THE BRONZE TURKEY 

THE ORGANS AND SIZE 

THIS variety holds the place of 
honor. It probably originated 
from a cross between the wild and 
the tame product. Its beautiful, rich 
plumage and size have come from the 
wild progenitor. To maintain this 
quality, crosses are continually made. 
In this way the mammoth size has been 
gained. Their standard weight ranges 
from twenty, thirty-six to forty and 
fifty pounds, according to age and 
sex. Probably more of this variety are 
grown each year than all the others. 
They have been pushed on all sides, 
almost to the exclusion of the others. 
Until within a few years, if possible, 

Page one hundred tweny-Uve 



the bronze turkey has been developed 
too much in the direction of size. While 
size within reasonable limits is to be 
desired and encouraged, when it is con- 
fined to length of thigh and shank, it 
is a gain of weight with but little ad- 
ditional value. 

COLORING 

The coloring of this variety is a 
ground of black bronze, or shaded with 
bronze. This shade is rich and glow- 
ing, and when the sun rays are reflect- 
ed from them, they shine like polished 
steel. The female is not as rich in 
coloring as the male, but both have the 
same color and shade. Much of its 
richness and color is lost by inbreeding, 
and it is improved each year with the 
wild specimens. Of all our domestic 
fowl, none suffer more from inbreed- 

Page one hundred twenty-six 




TURKEY RAISING IS AN INTERESTING AND HEALTHFUL OCCUPATION 



ing than the turkey. This should be 
guarded against at all times if it is 
hoped to gain the best results. 

SELECTION OF BREEDING STOCK 

Naturally the bronze turkey should 
be the largest in size, the most vigorous 
in constitution and the most profitable 
to grow. This would be the status of 
the variety at present were it not that 
too little attention has been given to 
the selection of the females for breed- 
ing stock. It should be fully under- 
stood that size and constitutional vigor 
come largely from the female, and to 
have this influence to the fullest extent, 
well proportioned, vigorous females in 
their second or third year should be 
selected as breeders. Do not select 
very large specimens for this purpose; 
those of a medium size are usually the 
best. Discard undersized females at 

Page one hundred twenty-seven 



all times, as they are of little value as 
producers. Length of shank and thigh, 
if out of proportion, should not be mis- 
taken for size. Full rounded body and 
breast indicates value most clearly; 
size and strength of bone indicate con- 
stitutional vigor which should be main- 
tained through the selection of the very 
best at all times for producing stock. 

When especial care is given to the 
selection of breeding birds, and the 
grower bears in mind those profitable 
market characteristics — compactness 
of form, length of breast and body, and 
constitutional vigor, the most satisfac- 
tory results may be obtained from the 
growing of this variety, but no matter 
how much care may be given those con- 
ditions, only partial success will come 
if inbreeding is permitted. The use 
of over-sized males with small females 

Page one hundred twenty-eight 



is of less advantage than the use of 
smaller males with well matured, me- 
dium sized females. 

MARKETING 

Of course, we cannot all sell our 
turkeys for breeding. That would en- 
tirely rob the table of its Thanksgiving 
luxury. After the turkeys are grown 
and ready for market, quite as much 
care and attention should be given to 
the killing and shipping as to the proper 
growing. When these things cannot 
be done to good advantage, it would be 
better to sell them alive. Buyers who 
are prepared to kill, dress, pack and 
ship turkeys and to save the feathers, 
should be in a position to pay what they 
are worth alive, and should be able to 
handle them at a profit better than can 
the grower, who may not be prepared 
to do this work to advantage. So 

Page one hundred twenty-nine 



much depends upon marketing them in 
the best condition that small growers 
should either dress and sell to their 
home market or, providing it can be 
done at a fair price, sell alive to some- 
one who makes a business of handling 
such stock. Kill nothing but well fat- 
tened stock. It seldom pays to sell ill- 
favored stock to the market. Do not 
give any feed to the turkeys for twelve 
hours before killing. This allows their 
crops and entrails to become empty and 
avoids much of the danger of spoiling. 
Full crops and entrails count against 
the value; they often taint the meat, 
and prevent it from being kept for any 
length of time. 

DRESSING 

Dry picking is always to be preferred 
when preparing fowl for market. 
When in fine condition, nicely picked, 
and sent to market without having 

Page one hundred thirty 



been packed in ice, the turkey is at its 
best and consequently commands the 
highest price. When the fowl is 
plucked, hang its head down in a cool 
place until all the animal heat is gone 
from the body, being careful not to 
hang it where it will be exposed to the 
cold as it is likely to freeze. Do not re- 
move the head, feet or entrails, but have 
the whole carcass, including the head 
and feet, perfectly clean. 

SHIPPING 

For shipping, pack as closely as pos- 
sible into close boxes or barrels, nicely 
lined with white or manila paper. Do 
not use brown, soiled or printed paper. 
Have the package completely filled so as 
to prevent the poultry from shifting. 
Have all the heads laid one way, breasts 
up. Do not use hay or straw for pack- 
ing as it marks and stains the fowl, de- 
Pa^ one hundred thirty-one 



s 



trading from the value. The above 
method can only be used when the poul- 
try is sent to market without being 
packed in ice, and when this can be done 
in safety either in refrigerator cars or 
for a short distance in cold weather, it 
is by far the best. 

The greater part, however, must be 
packed in ice. When necessary to do 
this, use nice clean barrels, cover the 
bottom with broken ice, then put in a 
layer of turkey, then a layer of ice ; con- 
tinue this until the barrel is packed full. 
Always use perfectly clean ice for pack- 
ing. Head the barrel tightly, and mark 
its contents plainly on the head. Never 
ship mixed lots of poultry in the same 
package if it can be avoided. 



Page one hundred thirty-two 






